Ottawa, and the Northern Railway Company was not in sympathy with the Government of Ontario. He could not understand, therefore, why hon. gentlemen opposite attempted to throw discredit on this statement. It was cruel to discredit the statement of the Treasurer of Ontario when he was wandering over the Province unable to find a resting place for the sole of his foot. The hon. member for South Brnce had not long ago held up Mr. CROOKS as a model statesman aud financier, but now opposed him like a Parliamentary pugilist and political bully. Hon. Mr. MACKENZIE called the member from Monck to order. The language used by that hon. gentleman was simply disgraceful. Mr. SPEAKER ruled that the language was unparliamentary. Mr. McCALLUM moved "that this Bill be not now read a second time, but that it be read a second time this day six months." The motion was lost on a division. Mr. COOK said it would be absolutely necessary in order to make this road pay to dredge the harbor of Collingwood so that vessels with a heavy draught could get access to it. This would be necessary in view of the increased trade of the North-West, and on Lakes Huron and Superior and of the northern country. He was of opinion that this was the best time, and the best opportunity for accomplishing the dredging of the harbor. The company were receiving a great favor in connection with the disposal of that lien. He moved "that this Bill do not now pass, but that it be referred to a Committee of the Whole to provide that if the company get such relief, the said company shall not later than December 1876 dredge the harbor of Collingwood so as to admit vessels drawing at least 14 feet of water." that trade. The Minister of Public Works no doubt honestly believed he could get no more from this railway than the amount proposed, but the hon. gentleman, had, last night, frankly admitted that no investigation had been made by the Government into the affairs of the company. The hon. gentleman had simply taken the figures of their predecessors, something which they were not always disposed to do with reference to railway matters; and he was glad they were not. This motion should be carried and the Premier should not oppose it. Hon. Mr. MACKENZIE said there. was no reason why the Government should give $30,000 for another object. If they were not going to get it for the Dominion they should not give it for Collingwood. This would simply be a diversion of the public money to purposes for which the House had not voted it. The amendment was lost on a division. The Bill was read the third time on a division and passed. THE CONTROVERTED ELECTIONS ACT. Hon. Mr. FOURNIER moved that the Bill to amend the Act respecting controverted elections be referred to a Committee of the Whole.-Carried. Hon. Mr. CAMERON (Cardwell) moved the following amendment: 5. "Whereas doubts have arisen as to the proper "construction of Sections 73, 101 and 103 of "the Dominion Election Act, 1874, and as to "the effect upon Elections held under the said "Act of the avoiding of previous Elections, it "is hereby enacted, that elections held under "the said Act, as well as Elections already held as "Elections hereafter to be held, shall be deemed. "and taken, as respects both candidates and. "voters, to be new Elections in law and in fact. "to all intents and purposes whatsoever. Except as the personal acts of the candidates "and the acts of agents of candidates done "with the knowledge and consent of such can"didates." 6. "The next preceding section shall also apply to Controverted Elections tried under the Controverted Elections Act, 1873, as to the effect agents done without the knowledge or consent upon the status of the candidate of the acts of of candidates, but no further or otherwise.” 7. "The sixty-seventh section of the said secondly recited Act is hereby amended by striking out therefrom, wherever they occur, the words and who is not a member of the House of Commons."" Mr. WOOD thought that the motion was fair and reasonable under the circumstances. If the Government were giving relief to this company to the large amount of over $3,000,000 the least they could do in return for that, was to make this harbor deep enough to accommodate vessels drawing fourteen feet of water. He thought in the interest of Ontario when the Government were constructing 8. "In every case of an Election Petition prea road to divert the traffic of the North-sented under the Controverted Elections Act, West by way of French River to Quebec they should enable Ontario to compete for Mr. McCallum. 1873, in which twelve months shall have lapsed since the said Petition was presented and it shall then be untried, the Respondent may require, and the Petitioner within six days after | agent, of which the member had not a pardemand, shall give new security in accordance with the terms of the Dominion Controverted Elections Act, 1874, for the payment of all costs, charges and expenses that may become payable by the Petitioner in respect of such Petitioner." Hon. Mr. TUPPER said it was inconvenient that amendments of such great importance should be made in committee. He would like to understand their propriety. This was a subject in which we were all deeply interested, and while there was every desire to take all necessary steps to carry out the objects of the Controverted Elections Act, it was just possible we could carry it to an extreme, and throw so many embarrasments and difficulties in the way of obtaining a repetition of the subject in the House, as to have the effect of making a great many men, that the country would desire to see in the House, and whom it would be an advantage to the country to have in the House, shrink from the efforts that would be necessary to secure a seat. It was quite possible to over-do the Controverted Elections Act, and produce a re-action nobody would like to see. If he understood this clause, it would subject a man, who had been once put upon his trial and acquitted, to having the whole matter gone over again, provided he run for election at a future period, and it was adopting a principle in relation to elections that did not exist in relation to anything else. He thought it was proper for any hon. member to give expression to a feeling widely prevalent in this House, that the Controverted Elections Act was quite stringent enough. Hon. J. H. CAMERON said if his hon. friend had been here the last two or three days, he would not have made those observations, because he would have known that the subject had been very carefully discussed yesterday, held over for further consideration to-day, and instead of hedging the Controverted Election Act so that a candidate should have more difficulties than at present it was actually intended to relieve him of the doubts and difficulties in which he was now placed; while it was making clear, what everybody desired should be made clear in the minds of all, that if a man or his agent had been guilty of personal bribery, he would not escape from it; but that if an election had been set aside for the acts of an Hon. Mr. Cameron. ticle of knowledge, he should not be liable to have the case tried over again, should he become a candidate for a second election. The law never intended that that should be the case, and the courts had declared that the law did not give any such intention; therefore, this clause was merely reiterating what the courts had declared was the intention of the law. Mr. McDOUGALL (Renfrew) said it appeared to him to be altogether a matter of costs, and it was a great hardship if a person who had been tried once and acquitted should be tried a second time and made pay the costs, but a person might on the second investigation succeed in proving a personal charge. He did not want to be understood as raising any objection whatever, provided that at the second trial it could be proved that the person formerly tried was guilty. Hon. Mr. BLAKE said he agreed with the observations of his hon. friend from North Renfrew respecting the question of costs, and it was possible that Parliament would have to interpose and lay down certain rules as to the manner in which costs should be disposed of. From several cases | of which he was aware in which personal charges had been made against candidates and pressed as far as they could be pressed, and the Judge had decided there was no foundation for them, and had acquitted the candidate of them, it was but justice under those circumstances that the candidate should be relieved from so much of the costs as depended upon the personal charges. On the contrary, the judgment had been in several cases that there would be no division of costs, and a candidate had had to pay costs, and had been unseated for acts committed by his agents, of which he had no knowledge, and was not responsible for, and when an attempt had been been made to inflict a personal stigma upon his name. He thought Parliament had never intended that the law should have such effect; and considered it would be a grievous injustice that when a candidate had been tried and acquitted he should be liable to be tried again and made to pay the costs exclusively. Hon. Mr. CAMERON (Cardwell) said there were several cases in which the Judges had awarded the expenses; and he agreed that a person who had made unfair and unjust charges of personal liability should pay that portion of the expense. He understood there was now under the consideration of the courts, as far as Ontario was concerned, a tariff with reference to that matter, and that rules concerning it would be distinctly laid down, so that in fact every one would know beforehand in a great measure precisely the class of liabilities, though not the amount of liability, to which he would be subject. He thought the cases in which this matter was involved might go before the whole Election Court. Mr. McDOUGALL (South Renfrew) inquired what objection there could be to have the clause put in so as to prevent the injustice mentioned being done. Mr. BOWELL said he thought that if a few more amendments were proposed to this Bill it would become rather formidable in its character, and the Minister of Justice would scarcely know his own bantling. When first introduced it contained but one small clause, which did not now convey the meaning first intended, for all that was material in that clause had been eliminated, It seemed to him that the amendment of the hon. member for Jacques Cartier went much farther than appeared on the surface. If the hon. member for Cumberland had been here he would have learned that instead of throwing difficulties in the way of members running for constituencies and retaining their seats if they were elected, this Bill would seem to have the effect of keeping them here, no matter how they obtained the seat. If as a layman he might express an opinion, he would say he was in accord with the hon. members for South Bruce and Cardwell in thinking that a candidate or member should not be held responsible directly for the acts of his agents, but he did not think the clause should go so far as to relieve the voter who had been proved to have been guilty of corruption, and that those who had been bribed to record their votes should be allowed at an election two or three weeks or months afterwards to go forward and record their votes, as would be the case if this amendment carried. Hon, Mr. BLAKE—They are disqualified from voting for eight years if they are found guilty of corrupt practices. Mr. BOWELL said if the hon. member referred to the 73rd clause he would find that it referred exclusively to the scrutiny Hort. Mr. Cameron. of votes, and if a man who had been purchased or bribed recorded his vote for a candidate, and it could be shown afterwards at a second contestation that such bribery had taken place, his vote could be struck off. He would like to know how the amendments would affect such a case. In his mind it would have the effect that the election being declared a new election then those purchased voters would have a right to go and record their votes again, provided they had not been disqualified and reported. They knew how certain provisions had been avoided. They knew how members who had been elected, had had the election contested, and had gone into court, and in order to prevent an exposure of the corruption and bribery that had taken place had allowed himself to be unseated; in fact had brought up some trifling case of a dollar or two that had been expended and had thereby got unseated, thus preventing an investigation into the actual facts of bribery and corruption that had taken place, and after preventing in this way an investigation of the charges of corruption those persons had become candidates for the next election, and could go and do the same thing again. This course would be facilitated by declaring the succeeding election a new election, by which means the hon. member who had introduced the amendment would no doubt accomplish the object he had in view. The 103rd section of the Act read :-"If, on the trial of any election petition, any candidate is proved to have personally engaged at the election to which such petition relates, as a canvasser or agent in relation to the election, any person, knowing that such person has, within eight years previous to such engagement, been found guilty of any corrupt practice, by any competent legal tribunal, or by the report of any Judge or other tribunal for the trial of election petitions, the election of such candidate shall be void." Why should Parliament repeal a clause so as to allow a candidate to employ a person whom he knows to have been guilty of purchasing votes and using all those acts that have been practised to secure elections, to repeat what he had done at previous elections. What the meaning of the clause was, as interpreted by that amendment, he confessed he did not understand. Another objection was that Hon. Mr. BLAKE said if the hon. member for Hastings knew that for the purposes of the Act the first and second elections were to be taken as one election, he knew more than the country generally did. raised on a previous occasion during the only to the status of a candidate but also present session by the hon. member for to voters. If the flood gates were to be Chateauguay, who objected to the passing opened so as screen the corruption that had of a railway Bill because it would interfere taken place at the late elections they with an action now pending in the courts should open them wide, and adopt the prinof law. This Bill, if passed, would inter-ciple that he who pays most should get fere with one or two dozen cases new be- most. fore the courts, by putting an interpretation on the law which it did not bear and could not be construed to mean, in order to prevent the unseating, if found to be guilty, of certain members who now occupied seats in the House. The whole object of the legislation of the last three or four years had been to prevent, by adopting the most stringent measures, bribery and corruption at elections; and yet the very moment we arrive at a stage in our history when these practices are about to be suppressed, propositions were submitted to the House which would have the effect of retaining in their seats hon. members who otherwise would be un-making it clear. Under the system of seated. If that were the will of the House, it was contrary to his ideas of correct legislation. Mr. BOWELL understood that was the decision of the English courts. Hon. Mr. BLAKE said it was part of the old law, but he was not speaking of that. He was speaking of the intention this House had in passing the Controverted Elections Act. It was the doubt which existed as to the intention of the Legislature in passing the Act that necessited open voting it was known how an elector who was bribed recorded his vote; but it was not so under the ballot. How would the proposition of the hon. member for Hastings, which was to strike off the vote of every elector in the second election, who had been bribed at the first election, apply that case neither of the candidates who ran in the first election stood in the second. Would the hon. member strike off the votes of electors in the second election who had been bribed in the first by candidates who were not in the field in the second election? Take an instance where one of of the old candidates stands again and is opposed by a new man. The former is exposed to the risk of having the votes Hon. Mr. HOLTON thought the discussion of the clauses of the Bill might have been safely left to the legal gentle men of both sides of the House. After the personal reference to himself, how-to the London contest, for instance. In ever, he would simply state that there was a very obvious distinction between cases, where material interests and vested rights were involved and election cases, where there were no vested rights, for no man could be said to have a vested right in his seat. He would regret to see any substantial positions of the law changed, pending the trial of cases arising under that law, but if there were a reasonable doubt as to the intention of Parliament in enact-recorded by voters who were bribed by his ing the law, there could be no wrong, hardships, or violation of sacred principles in legislation, in declaring what its intentions were. Any change in the substantial positions of the law as applicable to pending cases, would be very improper. He was not, however, prepared to say that any such change was postponed. Mr. BOWELL said it was, with diffidence that he, a layman, had discussed legal questions, but the subject was one that affected all hon. members, and each one might venture to express his opinion as to the effect of the passage of this law. He understood that the amendments was ex post facto legislation, and applied not Mr. Bowell. TT agents in the first election struck off in the second. Say forty or fifty were bribed. It is presumed that they voted for the same candidate at the second election and their votes are struck off, whereas the fresh candidate escapes that. There may have been sixty men who voted on his side who were bribed by the candidate he succeeds, but he loses none of these votes. That would be a palpable injustice. He did not believe that it was intended, in passing the law last session, that this should be the effect of it. He was entirely in favor of preserving this unexpected stringency of the law. A candidate who had been guilty of misconduct in the first election should suffer the consequences of it in the second., contingent Mr. BOWELL said there was but one way, then, to avoid the difficulty, and that was to prevent a respondent in an election case from electing to vacate upon acknowledging bribery by agents, or evidence being elicited to prove corrupt acts by himself or by his agents. If every case were thoroughly investigated, and all electors who were proved to have been bribed were struck off the list, it would meet the difficulty. Hon. Mr. BLAKE-Ask the hon. member for Kingston to frame a clause to that effect. Mr. BOWELL said the hon. member for South Bruce had the reputation of being the first to suggest throwing up the sponge as a means of getting out of the difficulty of a thorough investigation, and would therefore be equally well able to frame such a clause. Hon. Mr. BLAKE denied being the first to make such a suggestion. It would be utterly impossible by any process of law to arrange that a case should be tried when both parties to it desired to drop it. Mr.BOWELL could understand the difficulty in such a case as that, but not when the arrangement was on one side only. Hon. Mr. BLAKE said it would not be practicable in either case. After a general election it would be impossible. There were frequently two or three hundred particulars in a case, and three or four hundred witnesses summoned. The moment it is ascertained that enough is proved to avoid the election, the only course open is to avoid the election. Hon. Mr. CAMERON (Cardwell) said if the suggestion of the hon. member for Hastings were carried, it would be necesto provide રી very large sary fund for such cases. He recollected in one case every man who had voted was summoned as a witness. How would all these men be kept if they were all to be examined? He remembered a case in which he was engaged as counsel in the local elections. They had three days of it. They had summoned to the place where the trial was to be held every witness, and they filled every tavern in the town. On his side they paid the first day $700 as witness fees. The second day, after some of them had been examined and allowed to go, they spent $600 in the same way, and the third day the expense for witness fees was $520. His clients said if they were going to spend any more he did not think his property would stand it. When the lawyer was consulted on the other side he said they had spent still more, because none of their witnesses had been examined. That election was set aside after a few of the witnesses had been examined, and if the law had compelled them to proceed with the case and examine all these witnesses, it would have been necessary to provide a contingent fund or compel the gentlemen on both sides to sell or mortgage their farms to meet the expenses. Sir JOHN MACDONALD said some reference had been made to his case in this discussion. He had ascertained that his seat could not be held, and he instructed his counsel to say so at once, but the petitioner went on as far as he could to prove bribery by agents, and then to prove personal charges. So far as he (Sir JOHN) was concerned, there was no arrangement made between the petitioner or his counsel and himself to have the case set aside without going into the testimony. Hon. Mr. BLAKE said he was aware of that fact. He knew that the personal charges had been pressed as far as possible, and that the right hon. gentleman had taken the course which he (Mr. BLAKE) was satisfied was the correct one under the circumstances. The result of the proposition of the hon. member for Kingston would be to render this law perfectly impracticable. The old law was unworkable in consequence of the tribunal and the expense, and if this House obliged people to incur ruinous expense in carrying on an investigation the law would defeat its object. Mr. BOWELL said that in 19 cases out |